King's Man

by Angus Donald

  ‘It was nothing, my friend,’ he said. ‘If I had not drunk so much wine, I would have been faster. Are you hurt?’

  My wounds, thankfully, were not serious. The cut in my left side, slicing straight through the big purple-yellow bruise from where the ogre had kicked me, was shallow and only three inches long. Hanno would stitch it for me in the morning. Sir Nicholas, having studied my jawbone, told me I needn’t worry about the copious bleeding. Then he slapped me on the back and said that I would have a fine scar to remember the fight by. In truth, I have always been watched over by God and the saints in battle – either that or you could say that I had the Devil’s own luck.

  And so Sir Nicholas and I, leaving seven dead bodies lying in the street for the local watchmen to find and bury, or the wandering street pigs to eat – I cared not – walked back to Westminster Hall to seek out our pallets.

  At noon the next day Hanno and I set off towards Nottingham and Prince John. We had travelled only as far as Charing when we saw a horse-borne party trotting towards us. As they drew closer, I saw with a sinking feeling that it was Marie-Anne, accompanied by another woman, a priest, and a dozen men-at-arms in Queen Eleanor’s red-and-gold livery. The street was narrow at this point, so Hanno and I directed our horses over to the side to allow the party to pass. I said no words of greeting; indeed, I looked down at Ghost’s grey neck hoping that I would not catch the eye of Robin’s countess and only peeped at them out of the side of my eye.

  I need not have worried. Marie-Anne, looking almost regal in her haughtiness, walked her horse past mine, head high, eyes looking straight ahead, without even giving me the merest glance. The woman riding beside her was Godifa, and I could not help but notice that she was looking spectacularly beautiful. Her hair beneath a simple pure white headdress shone like gold, her neck was long and slender and she held her chin high, which brought out the line of her jaw and elegant cheekbones. She did not vouchsafe me the slightest look either. But the priest – it was Tuck, of course – hauled back on the reins as he came close, halting his mount and hailing me cheerfully. The men-at-arms riding behind him were forced to steer their mounts around the stationary priest in order to keep up with their female charges.

  ‘Alan,’ Tuck yelled, although we were only a few yards apart. ‘Well met. You are back from the German lands, I see. And I hear your mission was successful. Well done! You have served the King well. But what has happened to your face?’

  I lifted a hand to the freshly sewn cut on my jaw and was about to answer my old friend when I was interrupted by the Countess of Locksley. She did not speak to me, but rather called back over the rump of her horse to her confessor.

  ‘Father Tuck,’ she said, in a high imperious voice, ‘do not dawdle and pass the time of day with street scum and traitors. You will attend to me. Come up here, ride next to me this instant.’

  Tuck shrugged, half-smiled an apology, his round face screwed up with unhappiness, but he did as he was ordered and spurred his horse to catch up with his mistress.

  Hanno and I turned in our saddles to watch the party ride south towards Westminster. I was about to make some light remark to him when the right-hand lead horse peeled away from the cavalcade and a small figure began to gallop back towards us, her skirts flying in the wind. When she drew level with us, Goody hauled on her reins and brought her mount to a standstill, its legs pawing the air in front of Hanno and me. I noted that she had become an accomplished horsewoman since I had last seen her. When had I last spent any time with her? I thought to myself. Did I even really know her? Two red patches of rage coloured the soft, creamy skin of her cheeks as she brought her animal under control. And I could imagine, quite easily, that sparks were actually flying from her shining violet-blue eyes.

  ‘I cannot believe that you have the nerve to show your face in this country,’ she began, her voice low and crackling with anger, ‘after what you have done to Robin, after all he has done for you …’ She swallowed a breath. ‘You deceiving, back-stabbing, hateful man!’

  ‘Goody,’ I pleaded, ‘if you will let me explain—’

  ‘You can keep your explanations. I don’t want to hear your lies – I don’t ever want to see you again. And to think that once I felt …’

  She was magnificent – utterly beautiful, ravishing. Flushed, sparkling, her anger was a rare and rich jewel. If I had not been the object of her wrath, I believe I might have savoured that moment for many a year. As it was, I could only feel my cheeks flushing bright red to match hers; and a trickle of fresh blood seeping from the cut on my face.

  ‘Goody,’ I tried once again. ‘You don’t understand; you cannot understand … when they asked me those questions in the church …’

  ‘Don’t you dare to speak to me! Don’t you ever speak to me again. I hate you, I hate you!’

  And, to my astonishment, she burst into tears, wheeled her horse and, spurring savagely, galloped back to join the Countess’s cavalcade, which was by now more than a hundred yards away.

  Hanno had found something fascinating on the nail of his index finger and he was giving it his full attention. For myself, I was in no mood to discuss being snubbed and scolded by a pair of highly strung women, so we mutely turned our horses’ heads north towards the great Roman road and put as much distance as we could between us and the scene of my humiliation.

  Chapter Twelve

  Two days later, on a golden spring afternoon, with the sunlight glancing through the narrow windows, illuminating the swirls of smoke in the air and making mad and merry patterns on the rush-strewn floor, I stood before Prince John himself in the great hall that occupied the middle bailey of Nottingham Castle. The Prince was in a fine humour, feasting at one end of a long table laden with roast chickens and other dishes, laughing and jesting with a short companion seated to his right. Although the huge space of the great hall contained several dozen folk – knights, men-at-arms, priests, servants of all kinds – they were the only diners. I had been admitted to the hall by the Prince’s chamberlain, and loudly announced, but I was left to stand there, with Hanno at my side, waiting at the end of the long wooden board to be noticed by the most powerful man in the country; the man who Sir Nicholas avowed would surely be the next King of England. Yet it was not Prince John who drew my eye as I waited patiently; it was his small, dark companion who commanded my attention. He seemed to be enjoying the Prince’s particular favour that afternoon, talking intimately with his royal master, making half-heard jests and sharing the big silver platter of succulent roast fowl. It was the erstwhile Sheriff of Nottinghamshire himself: Sir Ralph Murdac.

  I was glad to note that his crippled left shoulder was still wedged high, but otherwise Murdac seemed in good health, a little heavier than when I had last seen him and clearly prospering in the Prince’s service. His familiar expensive black silk tunic was topped by a rich fur-lined mantle, though the weather was warm enough for this to be mere ostentation. His stubby fingers, smeared with chicken grease, now sported half a dozen chunky golden rings topped with fat, square-cut glinting jewels.

  Riding through the town of Nottingham on our way to the castle had brought back evil memories of my younger days there as a starving cutpurse, and that bad feeling remained with me now that I was in the very heart of England’s strongest fortress. I felt unnerved, unmanned: this castle had fearful memories for me. When I was a boy it had loomed over the town of Nottingham, a source of raw Norman power. From its gates mail-clad men on horseback had emerged to terrorize the population, collecting taxes, violating young maidens and summarily hanging anyone who opposed their will. In this very hall just three years ago, these two men had humiliated me, forcing me to sing for them when I was cold and wet and tired, and then tossing me pennies as if I was some starveling mountebank.

  Feeling the stirrings of rage in my belly, I suppressed them almost immediately. For the weeks and months ahead I needed to be what Tuck would have called a ‘cold-hot’ man; that is, a man who keeps his rage hidden deep
inside and only shows an icy indifference to the world. Robin was such a man, I remember Tuck telling me shortly after I joined the band of Sherwood outlaws in what seemed like another age. But like the shivering thief I had once been, I was hungry now, and even as I eyed Murdac’s golden rings with a larcenous envy that I had not felt in years, my stomach growled, a long, low sound like a war hound giving warning that it was about to attack. The noise was loud enough to startle Ralph Murdac and his royal master from their crisp, golden chickens. And they simultaneously looked up at me.

  ‘I beg your pardon, sire,’ I said, spreading a servile grin across my lips.

  The Prince must have known that Hanno and I were standing there, for we had been but ten paces from him for some while, but it had amused His Royal Highness to ignore us. My wayward stomach, it seemed, had forced him to acknowledge our presence.

  ‘Ah, there you are,’ said the Prince, suddenly all smiles and affability. ‘It is young Alan of Westbury, if I am not mistaken; the famous trouvère and noted swordsman. And my servants tell me that you are the man we have to thank for locating my noble brother King Richard in his stinking German prison – you know, I had feared that he might be dead …’

  As he said this, something flashed across his face, just for an instant, a look of – was it fear? Anger? Then it was gone and he was all bland smiles again.

  ‘Well, don’t stand on ceremony, my boy, come and join us. Could you manage a little chicken?’ The Prince clapped his hands and a servant appeared suddenly, as if by some mountebank’s conjuring trick. ‘A cup of wine and a stool for my young friend, and be quick about it,’ he ordered in his harsh cracked voice.

  So I sat down at the board with Prince John and Sir Ralph Murdac. It was a situation that I could never have conceived of five years ago. I could scarcely believe it now. I saw that Hanno was being led away by one of the servants – presumably he was to be fed in the kitchens or somewhere more suited to his lower rank. I helped myself to a small piece of chicken breast, and a hunk of fine-milled white bread.

  ‘You know Sir Ralph Murdac, of course,’ said Prince John, nodding at my mortal enemy, the man I most wanted to kill in the world, who sat on the other side of the table from me chewing a drumstick and regarding me down his nose with those icy blue eyes.

  ‘Sir Ralph,’ I said, managing a condescending smile, and nodding my head in a casual manner as if I regularly sat down to break bread with murdering little shit-weasels.

  And then I spoilt it all. I caught a waft of Murdac’s perfume, some foul lavender-based concoction and, as I always did when its odour raped my nostrils, I gave a mighty sneeze, a huge nasal trumpet blast, and then another. A chunk of half-chewed chicken shot out of my mouth and spattered the crisp white linen tablecloth.

  ‘I see your base-born manners have not improved,’ sneered Murdac. ‘But then, blood will out, as they say …’

  ‘Good God,’ croaked the Prince, interrupting his friend. ‘Are you sick, young Alan? You haven’t caught some Oriental plague, I trust, from your long sojourn in the Holy Land? Or some German ague? He-he-he!’ He seemed to find this very funny and chortled to himself for several moments, the red ringlets of his shoulder-length hair dancing with his merriment. Do not punch him in the face, Alan; do not do it, I thought. Be the cold-hot man. Be calm, or all is lost.

  ‘I am quite well, sire. It is perhaps a slight chill, that is all. I thank you for your royal concern.’

  ‘Well, I won’t keep you long, not if you’ve got a chill – or the dreaded plague. He-he-he! I understand that you wish to serve me – is this the truth?’

  I merely nodded; I did not trust myself to speak.

  ‘Well, you are in luck. Sir Nicholas de Scras, one of my finest knights, has personally recommended you. And that is good enough for me. We know whom you served before, and indeed why you are seeking a new lord, but I think the least said about that affair on St Polycarpus’s Day the better. Don’t you?’

  ‘I don’t trust him,’ Murdac said bluntly. ‘I think he is a spy sent by Locksley and he means to betray you.’

  I stared hard at Sir Ralph, boring into his chilly blue eyes with my own angry brown ones. But I kept my mouth shut. The cold-hot man, that was me.

  ‘Nonsense, Ralphie,’ said Prince John. ‘We were both there in the Temple Church when he betrayed his heretical master. We saw it with our own eyes; heard it with our own ears. And now that Locksley is loose, he will surely be coming for this fellow; very fond of vengeance is our Robert Odo. The boy’s clearly desperate; masterless, damn near penniless – he’s got nowhere else to turn.’

  The Prince had dropped his shallow pretence of being a friendly, jolly companion; he was talking about me as if I were not even in the great hall, let alone seated two feet away from him.

  ‘We’ll watch him, of course. He has a well-earned reputation as a slippery fellow. Low-born fellow, too, I hear. But if he plays us false – well … we will deal with that if and when. I need fighting men, Ralphie. Besides, Nick de Scras vouches for him, and that’s good enough for me.’

  Prince John looked at me directly now, and his voice changed and became harsh once more. ‘Let me speak plainly, Dale. I will give you the manors of Burford, Stroud and Edington. They lie in the West Country, not far apart from one another, and make up one knight’s fee. I expect you to do me faithful service in return. If you betray me, if you even disobey me, you will lose the manors – and your head. Am I clear? Now, do you accept my offer and will you swear to serve me loyally?’

  ‘I accept,’ I said.

  ‘Good,’ said the Prince. ‘I will have the charters drawn up and we will do the homage ceremony tomorrow at noon in the chapel. Now get out.’

  I was on my feet before I knew it. ‘I thank you, sire, from the bottom of my heart for this opportunity to serve you,’ I said, bowing low. ‘I am most grateful for your royal kindness.’

  But the Prince had returned to his plate of greasy chicken and so I bowed once more, ignoring Sir Ralph completely, and reflecting, as I made my way out of the great hall, that I would have to get better at this royal boot-licking. After all, I might be required to do it on a daily basis.

  The next day after a solemn Mass in the great chapel, during which I prayed even more fervently for my soul than usual, I knelt before Prince John, placed my hands between his, and swore a solemn oath before God. We then exchanged the kiss of peace and I ceremonially received three bulky parchment scrolls, hung with big green and black discs of sealing wax, which confirmed me as the lord of the plump West Country manors of Burford, Stroud and Edington. It would seem that I was going up in the world.

  After the ceremony, my new master called his knights together to witness what he called an ‘amusement’. A local freeman known as Wulfstan of Lenton had been accused of moving a marker stone, so as to encroach on some ploughland on one of Prince John’s estates. In reality, I had been told by a castle servant, a Nottingham man whom I knew slightly from earlier days, Prince John’s steward had moved the stone and Wulfstan had merely restored it to its original position. Normally, since good King Henry had reorganized the law, the case would have been tried by the defendant’s peers, twelve good men and true from the surrounding area, but Wulfstan clearly did not believe that he would receive a fair trial in a court packed with Prince John’s tenants and cronies. Thus, claiming that he was the great-grandson of Saxon thanes, and therefore had the right to bear arms, he demanded the old-fashioned wager of battle – to the death: a trial by combat.

  He was a rather slack-witted man, as fair-haired as Goody and with a bushy beard obscuring his face, but he was as proud as Lucifer. And I cheered him, silently, deep in my heart, for preferring to fight than allow his ancestral lands to be encroached on by his powerful royal neighbour.

  A square area about sixty foot on each side had been marked out with ropes in the outer bailey of the castle, inside the long wooden stockade that surrounded the entire fortification, but outside the stone walls of the
castle itself. The stone core of Nottingham Castle was shaped like a swaddled baby, with a circular upper bailey at the south end – the baby’s head – and a slightly bigger oval middle bailey – the baby’s swaddled body – connected to it and lying directly to the north. Both upper and middle baileys were built on a massive sandstone outcrop, the highest landmark for miles around, and they were walled with granite and dotted with high square towers every fifty paces or so for extra strength. Between the upper and middle baileys, indeed connecting them at the baby’s neck, loomed the great tower, a high square stone fortress that was the ultimate stronghold of the constables of Nottingham, the final place of refuge in a siege, if all went badly for the defenders. On the eastern and northern sides of the castle was a wide area known as the outer bailey, filled with tradesmen’s shacks, animal pens, stables, workshops, cookhouses, a few guest halls, some storehouses and, next to a deep well, a large newly built brewhouse where the ale for the whole castle was made. The outer bailey was protected by a twenty-foot-high earth-and-timber stockade – the castle’s first line of defence.

  The area roped off for the list lay to the north and east of the stone-built part of the castle, and it was thronged by castle denizens and by people from the thriving market town outside the walls to the east – my old hunting ground in my days as a hungry cutpurse.

  The crowd was packed three deep around all four sides of the list and already there was a hum of excitement at the coming contest. Each combatant was to be armed with a sword and shield, and I suspected that Wulfstan might have believed that he was actually going to fight Prince John himself. If that was true, he was in for a shock, for John had naturally delegated a champion to do his fighting for him. I confess, when I saw who the champion was, I had to suppress a start of unease myself. And the sight of his huge companion had me reaching instinctively for my sword hilt.